1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to wireless communications. More particularly, the present invention relates to techniques for performing data transmission and error control employing separate communications links.
2. Art Background
Since gaining approval by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in 2002, ultra wideband (UWB) techniques have become an attractive solution for short-range wireless communications because they allow for devices to exchange information at relatively high data rates.
Although UWB systems for short-range networks are relatively new, their transmission techniques have been known for decades. In fact, the first radio transmission was made by a UWB technique when Heinrich Hertz discovered radio waves in 1887. This discovery was made with a spark gap transmitter, which can be viewed as an early UWB radio. Later on, such transmitters were banned because they emitted wide spectrum transmissions.
Current FCC regulations permit UWB transmissions for communications purposes in the frequency band between 3.1 and 10.6 GHz. However, for such transmissions, the spectral density has to be under −41.3 dBm/MHz and the utilized bandwidth has to be higher than 500 MHz.
There are many UWB transmission techniques that can fulfill these requirements. A common and practical UWB technique is called impulse radio (IR). In IR, data is transmitted by employing short baseband pulses that are separated in time by gaps. Thus, IR does not use a carrier signal. These gaps makes IR much more immune to multipath propagation problems than conventional continuous wave radios. RF gating is a particular type of IR in which the impulse is a gated RF pulse. This gated pulse is a sine wave masked in the time domain with a certain pulse shape.
IR transmission facilitates a relatively simple transmitter design, which basically requires a pulse generator and an antenna. This design does not necessarily require a power amplifier, because transmission power requirements are low. In addition, this design does not generally require modulation components such as voltage controlled oscillators (VCOs) and mixers, because the impulses are baseband signals.
In general, IR receiver designs are more complex than their corresponding transmitter designs. However, these designs are much simpler than conventional receiver designs because they typically do not employ intermediate frequency (IF) signals or filters. However, to fulfill spectral requirements, IR impulses have to be very short in duration (e.g., a couple of nanoseconds). This requirement places stringent timing demands on receiver timing accuracy. The fulfillment of these demands can also provide IR receivers with accurate time resolution and positioning capabilities.
Although UWB offers high transmission rate over a wireless medium, the reliability of such data transfer is at issue as with other transmission approaches. Thus, it is desirable to provide an error control scheme or mechanism, such as an Automatic Repeat reQuest (ARQ) mechanism, to ensure reliable data transfer. However, such an approach would entail implementation of separate ARQ messages which utilize the same UWB radio and would thus reduce the available bit rate. Since UWB employs low TX power, the occurrence of transmission errors may also be common which may result in numerous retransmissions.
Existing FCC regulations require that a UWB capable device may only transmit UWB signals when it is associated with a receiver. Strictly interpreted, these regulations prohibit devices from sending UWB transmissions for the purpose of setting up a UWB connection. Thus, devices may need to use alternate transmission techniques to exchange information and parameters necessary to establish a UWB link.
Other short-range networks exist but do not provide the high data rates offered by UWB. One such network is Bluetooth. Bluetooth defines a short-range radio network, originally intended as a cable replacement. It can be used to create ad hoc networks of up to eight devices, where one device is referred to as a master device. The other devices are referred to as slave devices. The slave devices can communicate with the master device and with each other via the master device. The Bluetooth Special Interest Group, Specification Of The Bluetooth System, Volumes 1 and 2, Core and Profiles: Version 1.1, Feb. 22, 2001, describes the principles of Bluetooth device operation and communication protocols. This document is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety. The devices operate in the 2.4 GHz radio band reserved for general use by Industrial, Scientific, and Medical (ISM) applications. Bluetooth devices are designed to find other Bluetooth devices within their communications range and to discover what services they offer.